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July 2023

Reflecting, and looking ahead

Dear Friend,

IEC is at an important pivot point.

As you can read in our new 2022 Impact Report, we have made tremendous progress rallying coalitions and laying the foundation in major initiatives to train general clinicians, improve emergency room care, and get healthcare to focus on what matters most to people with IDD. 
All that work will begin bearing fruit later this year. 

We expect to launch Always Uniquely Me, a digital app to help people self-advocate in emergency situations. We’ll release a consensus Health Outcomes Framework so healthcare can begin tracking what’s important. And we’ll announce a widely endorsed national strategic roadmap for training general clinicians.

We are also excited to promote the work of others, such as groups building IDD curricula, which we will amplify through the ABC3 coalition to vast numbers of clinicians in training and in practice.

We expect the next phase to be explosive, in both volume of work and impact. New partners and funders have already approached us. 

We hope you will join us, and make a gift to fuel this palpable change.
Thank you for your support,

Mai Pham
President and CEO

NEW: Impact Report

The reflections on the events of 2022 in our new Impact Report highlight how we center our work on the perspectives and leadership of disability self-advocates. Take a look!
 
Read the Report

Thank you, RWJF


We are pleased to announce that IEC was awarded a generous grant of $300,000 from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Support from RWJF gives IEC the opportunity to connect our work to other initiatives supported by the Foundation as well as magnify our impact. 

NEW: Director of Development

IEC is delighted to welcome Anna Christ as our new Director of Development. Anna comes to us after serving as Director of Corporate & Foundation Relations at So Others Might Eat in Washington, DC. 

Her 25-year career in the nonprofit sector has included fundraising, consulting, social welfare policy research and analysis, state-level advocacy, community building, and program management.

Anna holds an MSW from Washington University in St. Louis and a BS from Presbyterian College in South Carolina. She also earned a graduate certificate in organization development from the NTL Institute. 

If you would like to learn more about ways to support IEC, please email Anna at achrist@ie-care.org.

IEC out and about

Mai recently did a Q&A with Megan Cook of the Rx Foundation about how universal design (making something easy to use for as many people as possible) would make healthcare better, not just for people with IDD, but for everyone. Read the interview.
Mai joined the Urban Institute for a panel marking the anniversary of a landmark report on health inequity. Unequal Treatment at 20: Accelerating Progress toward Health Care Equity explored bold solutions to eliminate health disparities for Black/Brown people and those with disabilities. Watch the panel.
Mai also participated in several podcasts recently.

On What’s Working In Washington, she shared how having a child with IDD gave her an inside look at the gaps in the healthcare system. 
She joined hosts Meg Koepke and Melissa Cohen for the Medicare Meet-Up podcast from Aurrera Health Group. Listen here.
And she spoke with Dr. Hackie Reitman on the Different Brains podcast about all things IEC.

Watch the recording here.

NEW: IDD and the CDC

New data from the CDC show that developmental disabilities have become more prevalent, rising to 8.56% of children age 3-18 in the US.

IEC estimates that there are 16 million+ children and adults with IDD. While the new data are a step in the right direction, the survey only considered children. We need to improve data on all people with IDD to drive change at scale.

Let's Make IDD Visible.

NEW: Special Report from The National Academy of  Medicine

Mai chaired a committee for The National Academy of Medicine that recently released Valuing America’s Health: Aligning Financing to Reward Better Health and Well-Being.

The report compares the need for urgent action on declining health in America to the urgent need for climate action. It calls for government to set regulatory and financial incentives that value a community's health, such as favorable tax rebates for cities that improve maternal mortality, or requiring insurance plans to cover some level of home- and community-based services. 
 
This would encourage investors to refocus on things we know improve health (like affordable housing).

Investing in the things that people need to thrive will produce better health for everyone, including people with disabilities. 
You can help us make healthcare better for people with disabilities so they can live life to the fullest. 
Donate Now

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